The Ultimate Collection of Murphy's Laws

Where the laws reside.More than 1250 Laws, Postulates, Axioms and Corollaries

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Murphy's Law of the Day

The Origin of Murphy's Law

Murphy's Law:
prov. The correct, original Murphy's Law
reads: "If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of
those ways can result in a catastrophe, then someone will do it."
This is a principle of defensive design, cited here because it is
usually given in mutant forms less descriptive of the challenges of
design for lusers. For example, you don't make a two-pin plug
symmetrical and then label it `THIS WAY UP'; if it matters which
way it is plugged in, then you make the design asymmetrical.

Edward A. Murphy, Jr. was one of the engineers on the rocket-sled
experiments that were done by the U.S. Air Force in 1949 to test
human acceleration tolerances (USAF project MX981). One experiment
involved a set of 16 accelerometers mounted to different parts of
the subject's body. There were two ways each sensor could be glued
to its mount, and somebody methodically installed all 16 the wrong
way around. Murphy then made the original form of his
pronouncement, which the test subject (Major John Paul Stapp)
quoted at a news conference a few days later.

Within months `Murphy's Law' had spread to various technical
cultures connected to aerospace engineering. Before too many years
had gone by variants had passed into the popular imagination,
changing as they went. Most of these are variants on "Anything
that can go wrong, will"; this is sometimes referred to as
Finagle's Law. The memetic drift apparent in these mutants
clearly demonstrates Murphy's Law acting on itself!

Finagle's Law
n. The generalized or `folk' version of
Murphy's Law, fully named "Finagle's Law of Dynamic
Negatives" and usually rendered "Anything that can go wrong,
will". One variant favored among hackers is "The perversity of
the Universe tends towards a maximum" (but see also Hanlon's Razor).
The label `Finagle's Law' was popularized by SF author
Larry Niven in several stories depicting a frontier culture of
asteroid miners; this `Belter' culture professed a religion
and/or running joke involving the worship of the dread god Finagle
and his mad prophet Murphy.

Hanlon's Razor
prov. A corollary of Finagle's Law, similar
to Occam's Razor, that reads "Never attribute to malice that which
can be adequately explained by stupidity." The derivation of the
common title Hanlon's Razor is unknown; a similar epigram has been
attributed to William James. Quoted here because it seems to be a
particular favorite of hackers, often showing up in sig blocks,
fortune cookie files and the login banners of BBS
systems and commercial networks. This probably reflects the
hacker's daily experience of environments created by
well-intentioned but short-sighted people. Compare Sturgeon's Law.

Sturgeon's Law
prov. "Ninety percent of everything is crap".
Derived from a quote by science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon,
who once said, "Sure, 90% of science fiction is crud. That's
because 90% of everything is crud." Oddly, when Sturgeon's Law is
cited, the final word is almost invariably changed to `crap'.
Compare Hanlon's Razor, Ninety-Ninety Rule. Though this
maxim originated in SF fandom, most hackers recognize it and are
all too aware of its truth.

The Way It Goes Sometimes... Murphy's Laws

Murphy's Original Law

If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, then someone will do it.

Murphy's Law

If anything can go wrong -- it will.

Murphy's First Corollary

Left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse.

Murphy's Second Corollary

It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious.

Quantized Revision of Murphy's Law

Everything goes wrong all at once.

Murphy's Constant

Matter will be damaged in direct proportion to its value.

The Murphy Philosophy

Smile... tomorrow will be worse.

Conclusions

If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the first one to go wrong. Corollary - If there is a worse time for something to go wrong, it will happen then.

If several things that could have gone wrong have not gone wrong, it would have been ultimately beneficial for them to have gone wrong.

Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.

If anything can't go wrong, it will anyway.

If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which something can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way, unprepared for, will promptly develop.

If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something.

Everything takes longer than you think.

You never find a lost article until you replace it.

If nobody uses it, there's a reason.

You get the most of what you need the least.

Nature always sides with the hidden flaw.

Mother nature is a bitch.

Thanks

Special thanks to these people for supplying their own laws:

Patrick Meeder for proof reading and adding Military and Research laws

Ralf Kleineisel from the Astronomisches Institut at the University of Würzburg for his Laws of Observational Astronomy

Wayne Mattox for sending his Murphy & Friends Laws of Antiques. He maintains the webpage www.antiquetalk.com

These pages contain additional laws from several sources. I removed the list because several sites were already broken down.

Having read these pages you can readily see that Murphy was an optimist.
If the truth of all these laws makes you depressed, just remember that Murphy's Law even applies to itself. At times, it too goes wrong, allowing you to accomplish something.

I would appreciate all links to other Murphy resources, comments and of course more laws sent to me.